Tom Davis put it well on the phone this morning when I asked how his world was going in general. The
governor’s chief of staff said some things were going well, but:

"DOT was a disappointment, obviously."

No kidding. Tom said maybe it would be possible to get something halfway decent out of conference committee, but he shouldn’t hold his breath. With the Senate bill being less than useless and the House bill being, as he put it, "not as much as we would want, and not as much as y’all would want," we’re pretty close to being able to chalk up the DOT issue as a huge missed opportunity to improve the quality and accountability of government in South Carolina. My words, not Tom’s. He’s slightly kinder to the House plan than I am. For me, if you’ve still got a commission, you don’t have reform.

For a view that is a lot kinder to the House than either mine or Tom’s here’s the latest memo from Patty Pierce, who has been lobbying on behalf of the Coastal Conservation League‘s transportation reform coalition. The House approach is more or less just what the coalition wanted, which is one reason we don’t have reform. Both the private group wanting reform and the governor went to the table unwilling to fight for a straight Cabinet arrangement.

Anyway, that’s water under the crumbling, neglected bridge. Here’s what Patty had to say to supporters:

DOT
Reform Team,
In the
Senate: The Senate completed its work on S.355, the
Senate version of DOT reform, after four weeks of debate, and the bill has been
forwarded to the House for its consideration.  S.355 includes four of our DOT Reform
Coalition’s priorities, but overall this bill is NOT as strong the House DOT
Reform bill, H.3575, by Representative Annette Young (R-Dorchester).

In
terms of justifying and
prioritizing transportation projects, S.355 requires the DOT to craft
a “methodology for determining how to design the Statewide Transportation
Improvement Program (STIP) that includes the schedule of priorities for all
major construction and funds allocated to complete those projects”. In crafting the methodology the following
criteria—which our Coalition supports—must be
considered:

a)
Financial viability, including the life cycle analysis of estimated

Maintenance and repair costs over
the expected life of the project;

b)
Public safety;

c)
Potential for economic development;

d)
Traffic volume;

e)
Truck traffic;

f)
The pavement quality index;

g)
Alternative transportation solutions;

h)
Consistency with local land use plans;

i)
Environmental impact; and

j)
Federal requirements for designing and setting priorities for the
STIP.

We are thankful that S.355 includes the above criteria, but the
bill does not clearly state that all projects will be justified and prioritized
according to the criteria as our Coalition has advocated. Also, the methodology will be a DOT internal
policy document as opposed to a regulation as required in H.3575, the good House
bill.  H.3575, requires the DOT to
“establish a priority list within the STIP…when compiling this list of projects
or changing this list, the department shall use” the criteria that
our Coalition has advocated.

Public
hearings
are required in S.355 prior to adopting the “prioritization” methodology, prior
to adopting the STIP, and prior to moving forward with large road and bridge
projects; this last item was not included as a separate item in the bill as was
suggested to staff, so this section needs to be further improved. The additional public hearings required in
S.355 are great opportunities for the public at-large and individual communities
affected by major transportation projects to voice concerns/praise about the
proposed methodology, the STIP, and individual projects. Having real public
hearings where the public can address a panel and/or hearing officer regarding
projects is a great improvement over current DOT practices.

The
most troublesome aspect of S.355 is the creation of a new legislative review
process through the establishment of a Joint Transportation
Review Committee (JTRC)—a 10 member committee composed of 6
legislators and 4 public members. The
JTRC will review and comment on the “prioritization” methodology and the
STIP. After review of the STIP, the DOT
is then required to promulgate the STIP as a regulation which requires approval
by the General Assembly.  Establishing road and bridge project
priorities has always been the responsibility of the SC DOT.  This new review by the JTRC and mandated
approval of the STIP by the General Assembly could undermine the DOT’s objective
analysis of transportation projects guided by the criteria included in the bill
that should be used to justify and prioritize all STIP projects.

One
final concern is a provision that states “any project placed in the STIP at the
request of a metropolitan planning organization or council of government must
not be removed.” That means a community
that has proposed a project, may not later ask that such project be removed from
the STIP if the MPO or COG determines the project is no longer wanted or
necessary.  To remove a project from the
STIP, the General Assembly must adopt a new regulation, which could easily take
more than a year if this provision were approved in a final DOT Reform
bill.

In
terms of governance, S.355 allows the
current
DOT
Commission to remain in place until a
new 7 member Board is
established. All seven members would be
appointed by the Governor and confirmed by the Senate.  Six members would
represent congressional districts, and one member would be appointed at-large
to serve as
the Board
Chairman.  The
Board would hire an at-will Executive Director to run the daily operations of
the DOT.

Also
in the Senate, Senator Ritchie (R-Spartanburg) recalled H.3575, the strong House
DOT Reform bill, from the Senate Transportation Committee and placed the bill on
the Senate’s contested calendar.  This
action by Senator Ritchie is very helpful. H.3575 may be a vehicle to move a DOT Reform bill forward this
legislative session in the event a conference committee (3 House members and 3
Senate members) gets bogged down in its negotiations. 

In
the House: One
minor glitch occurred last week just before H.3575 was adopted and approved by
the House. No need to worry. This will just give me one more thing to work
on next week. When the final amendment
was adopted during the House debate on H.3575, the amendment was not adopted as
a “perfecting” amendment, so two previous amendments hat had been approved by
the House were inadvertently deleted. First, the House approved adding Representative Loftis’ amendment that
required consideration of “congestion” to the list of criteria used to justify
and prioritize projects, which we support. Second, the House also approved our Coalition’s priority, “consideration
of alternative transportation solutions”. Unfortunately, I discovered this week that both of these amendments were
“accidentally” deleted in the final version of the bill, so I will work with the
House staff and Representatives to see if we can get these two amendments added
back into a House approved DOT Reform bill.

If
you have any questions about DOT Reform, or the two bills that have been
approved by the House and Senate, please do not hesitate to contact me. I’d be glad to help you.

I’ll
send out an update next week on the progress the House makes in regard to DOT
Reform. Until then, I’ll keep working to
encourage the House and Senate to include the strongest provisions of both DOT
Reform bills in the final compromise legislation.

Patty
Pierce
League
Lobbyist
[email protected]

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